Mr. Steve Ashton (Opposition House Leader): I rise on a matter of privilege, Madam Speaker, and it will be followed by a motion. It is a very serious matter.

We have just had it confirmed in this House by the Minister of Urban Affairs (Mr. Reimer) that the presiding officer of this House, you, Madam Speaker, attended a cabinet committee of Urban Affairs, something that we raised in this House yesterday, something that is a complete violation of the impartiality of the Speaker. I cannot stress enough how important this is and how important it is to note that this was a cabinet committee of which we as members of the Legislature and members of the public are not even entitled to know what was discussed. Not only were you there, but we are now told by the Minister of Urban Affairs that he cannot disclose what was discussed at that very meeting.

I want to point, Madam Speaker, to the fact that we know we have before us legislation dealing with the City of Winnipeg, outlined in the Speech from the Throne, which no doubt was part of the discussions of the Urban Affairs committee of cabinet, and I cannot think of anything that is a greater violation. First of all, to be in that meeting in the first place, but, second of all, to be involved with any discussions that relate to legislation that is going to be brought before this House that was outlined in the throne speech.

Yesterday, I quoted Beauchesne Citation 168, the chief characteristics attached to the office of Speaker in the House are authority and impartiality. I can reference Erskine May: confidence in the impartiality of the Speaker is an indispensable condition of the successful working and procedure, and many conventions exist which have as their object not only to ensure the impartiality of the Speaker, but also to ensure this impartiality is generally recognized. I could quote Laundy, the office of the Speaker, which I think is the Canadian authority in terms of the role of the Speaker. The Speaker is above sexual interests and immune from party influences. He, or in this case she, serves only the House of Commons regardless of which faction might temporarily be in control of it. Each individual member receives, and is entitled to expect, the same consideration from the Speaker, but the overriding duty of the Speaker is to the House collectively. The Speaker is not only impartial, he or she is seen to be impartial.

This is not something that is unique to this House. It goes back for many centuries of parliamentary tradition, and I think back, Madam Speaker, on the most famous quote by a Speaker in history, 1642, Speaker Lenthall, who established the principle of impartiality when the King came to seek the arrest of treason of five members of Parliament, and the Speaker dropped to his knees and stated: May it please Your Majesty, I have neither eyes to see nor tongue to speak in this place, but as the House is pleased to direct me whose servant I am here. I humbly beg Your Majesty's pardon, but I cannot give any other answer than this to what Your Majesty is pleased to command of me. From that point on, every parliament has adopted one of the fundamental laws of Parliament, being the impartiality of the Speaker.

I find it interesting, reference to previous Speakers, and you know I wish the Premier (Mr. Filmon) was here, because I would like to quote back words that the Premier expressed in 1987, not about a Speaker attending a cabinet committee, but attending a retreat, basically a social event of a caucus. The then Leader of the Opposition stated: if Beauchesne is good enough for her to base her rulings on in the House, it ought to be good enough for her on this issue.

An Honourable Member: Who said that?

Mr. Ashton: Gary Filmon, then Leader of the Opposition.

I have quoted the authorities. We quoted the authorities many times in the past. I do not know how many times we have to stand on our feet and make it clear that we, as members of the opposition and I would say many Manitobans, and I have received comments and calls from many Manitobans on this issue, that we have no confidence in your ability to act as Speaker, Madam Speaker, I can tell you, if we had concerns before with what happened with other issues relating first with your taking away the ability of members of the House to call any policy racist, something that is clearly a violation of our freedom of speech or your conduct last year with MTS, your conduct again these last few days with rulings that have sat unattended for more than one year.

Madam Speaker, if we had any doubts about our concern about your ability to be impartial and nonpartisan, there is no doubt in our minds that the revelation that you attended not only a meeting--the Minister of Education (Mrs. McIntosh) discussed education policy issues--but that you have attended, by admission of the government, a cabinet committee dealing with Urban Affairs.

Madam Speaker, please do the right thing. I will be moving a motion that will be calling for your resignation, but please understand, as I believe many other Speakers have understood in previous history, that you cannot continue in this House as Speaker, other than being Speaker in name only, if you do not have the confidence and support of all members of this House. You do not have the confidence of the official opposition. You do not understand, and I want to say to you, if you wish to participate in those kinds of committees, you can do so tomorrow without any criticism from anyone in this House if you resign as Speaker.

I say to the government, as well, who was asleep at the switch on this one? Who in that committee--and I point to the minister on this--did not realize the terrible position that you were not only placing this government in--showing I think the growing arrogance after close to 10 years of government, the abusive power that we are seeing more and more from this government, the smugness--but did anyone not dare to suggest to the Speaker--I believe showed a fundamental lack of judgment. Did the minister, did no one else in that committee not say to the Speaker, perhaps you should not be here, this is a cabinet committee? I mean, have you lost touch that much that you do not understand that to the average member of the public there appears to be something fundamentally wrong with the Speaker sitting in on cabinet committees and then coming in here and supposedly being impartial?

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Madam Speaker, the right thing to do is to resign, to take your place as an honourable member. As a member of that government, if you wish, you can attend every one of the committee meetings you want to as a private member of this House, but so long as you are Speaker, you are a servant of this House. You must have the confidence of all members of this House. That is something you do not have.

That is why I move, seconded by the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Doer), that this House call on the Speaker to resign because of her violation of the principles of the impartiality and nonpartisanship of the Speaker's office.

Motion presented.

Madam Speaker: Given the seriousness of this matter, I am sure that the House would want to debate it at the earliest opportunity, and therefore the question is that this House call on the Speaker to resign because of her violation of the principles of the impartiality and nonpartisanship of the Speaker's office.

Ms. Becky Barrett (Wellington): I rise in complete support with the very serious matter of privilege and motion that has followed from that matter of privilege.

The parliamentary system that we operate under in this House and throughout the hundreds of countries that use the parliamentary system is based on several things: one, that there is a government; two, that there is usually an opposition, although that once did not happen in one of the Atlantic provinces recently and some of the government members actually acted as an opposition. The third thing is that there is a position of Speaker which mediates, which ensures that the debate, that the matters of the House go forward in a reasonable and effective manner.

The role of Speaker in this parliamentary system that we have evolved is a very difficult one because the Speaker, in our system, comes from the elected members of the Legislature. So the Speaker is, at the beginning of his or her term, or before he or she is selected, a partisan member of either the government or the opposition and has been elected as a partisan member of the Legislature. Then this current selection process--it is not an election which we would like, but the selection process moves that individual from that partisan stand that he or she was elected on and physically moves him or her from her seat to the front of the Chamber to act as the Speaker.

That movement from his or her seat as a member to the Speaker's chair--from that time that they leave their chair as an MLA to the time that they take their chair as Speaker, during that movement, that is when the impartiality comes into play. No longer is that individual a government member. No longer is that individual, during the operations of the role of Speaker, a partisan member. For over 300 years that has been the unalterable rule of the Speaker. Parliament cannot function without that impartiality of the Speaker.

The issue today is that the person who holds that impartial chair as a Speaker not only attended a caucus meeting, not only attended a party, but attended a cabinet committee where the object of the debate and the discussion at that committee was the legislative agenda of the government, in this case The City of Winnipeg Act amendments which are going to be brought forward as mentioned in the Speech from the Throne. Who knows what else? We only know the Speaker attended one cabinet committee meeting. Perhaps there were others in which other legislation was debated, where the role of the cabinet committee is to be partisan; it is to discuss legislation, to discuss policy, to discuss strategies, to discuss pros and cons of the legislative agenda.

Are the minutes of that cabinet committee open? No, they are not open even to caucus members of the government, I would imagine. They certainly are not open to me as one of the 57 members of the Legislature, or even more, they are not open to the members of the public, and the minister today just reiterated that very point when he said he would not discuss the agenda of that cabinet committee. There is a logic here, and we are not talking against the need for cabinet to discuss things in privacy. That is an accepted form of the parliamentary system as well. What we are saying here is that there is no role for the nonpartisan impartial Speaker to be present at those meetings. That is the issue.

Finally, I would like to say that it has appalled me over the last two days to see, No. 1, when the issue was first raised yesterday in Question Period, the looks on the faces of the government members; they had no idea why this was a question. What? There is no problem here.

An Honourable Member: They did, because they could not remember.

Ms. Barrett: They could not remember, but at the very beginning, the first question, so what is the big deal? And again today the same thing. These members of the government do not understand or they do understand and they are saying nothing. They do not understand the role, the vital role of the impartiality of the Speaker, and that is why--neither does the Speaker who has to take responsibility for going to that meeting. Whether she was invited or invited herself, she attended that meeting. That is an absolute derogation of the role of the Speaker, and therefore I strongly support the motion that the Speaker must resign so that the parliamentary system in this province can come back to its status as enabling us to do the work of the people of the province of Manitoba.

Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Inkster): Madam Speaker, I, too, would like to say a few words on this particular issue because time and time again it seems that we are wanting to address the whole issue of what has been happening in the Chair since the last provincial election.

I again will emphasize I am not standing here in order to attempt to befriend you in any fashion; I am standing because I firmly believe that in fact there is an injustice that is occurring inside this Chamber. This injustice is a personal, vindictive opposition led by the New Democratic Leader of this Chamber that shows a vindictive attitude towards you, Madam Speaker, and I find that it is absolutely inconceivable that an opposition would go to the degree that they have gone time and time again. Ever since the last election, the official opposition has not respected Madam Speaker. Divide and conquer was the mentality that was there. Back on November in 1995 you moved a motion of nonconfidence. We continuously debate inside this Chamber the role that you have to play. What upsets me is that there are many other issues that need to be debated inside this Chamber. We need to get over this and start the other debate.

Madam Speaker, I have serious problems that you actually attended a meeting that the New Democrats have made mention of. I have very serious problems with that.

Some Honourable Members: Oh, oh.

Mr. Lamoureux: Be patient; let us be patient. I have very serious problems that the Speaker of this Chamber is in fact not elected. We should have an elected Speaker. We should also have guidelines for the Speaker in terms of what the Speaker should and should not be able to do, but let us take a look.

Again, we have limited research in the Liberal--amongst the three Independents, and what I did do is I canvassed across the country in terms of what other Speakers have done. In B.C., the Speaker will not venture into space used by members of the Executive Council. When constituents' issues or need arises for discussion with ministers, the government ministers head to the Speaker's office. The Speaker in B.C. is also provided with his own dining room and meetings with government ministers take place there or in committee rooms. Private member meetings are not uncommon. No one in the B.C. Speaker's office knows when this rule started, but it is accepted practice from time.

In Alberta, the Speaker will attend caucus meetings outside of normal sessions; in New Brunswick, does not attend caucus meetings; in Nova Scotia, will attend caucus meetings outside of normal session; in Ontario, does not attend caucus meetings; in the Yukon, will attend caucus meetings outside of the normal session. The Northwest Territories have not gotten back to us. In P.E.I., yes, they will attend caucus outside of the normal sitting of the Legislature; in Saskatchewan, the Speaker does attend caucus meetings outside of session. You know what I was told from the research, in fact, the Speaker, the New Democratic Speaker, tomorrow is going to a classroom with the Minister of Education, I believe, inside a constituency.

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Now, Madam Speaker, why do I bring that up? The simple reason is that there really are no rules that are there that say in terms of this is what you can and you cannot do--Beauchesne says. This is the reason why I feel offended that in fact, yes, you attended these. I would be very disappointed, if in the future, you were to attend anything to do with policy development. I believe that is wrong, but you cannot all of a sudden bring up the issue in terms of attending a meeting and then start criticizing it when there is no precedent across the country which gives it legitimacy or illegitimacy.

Some Honourable Members: Yes, there is.

Mr. Lamoureux: What are you talking about? I just cited provinces with the Speakers--[interjection] Madam Speaker, the member for Thompson (Mr. Ashton) even made reference--

Madam Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Gary Kowalski (The Maples): Madam Speaker, we are only a small group here, but I would like to hear the member for Inkster's (Mr. Lamoureux) arguments and I do not want the rabble, the shouting, that those who scream the loudest are right. I would like to hear the member for Inkster.

Madam Speaker: The honourable member for The Maples indeed has a point of order. It was getting rather raucous in here and very difficult to hear the honourable member for Inkster's remarks. The honourable member for Inkster deserves the same privileges as all other members in this Chamber.

Madam Speaker: The honourable member for Inkster, to continue his debate.

Mr. Lamoureux: Madam Speaker, it was interesting. I had read an article in one of our daily papers in which it makes reference to the fact that Myrna Phillips, the former Speaker, actually attended a caucus retreat. The member for Thompson (Mr. Ashton) said, well, it was a retreat. That is a special event. We do not discuss policy. We do not have anything to do with policy at a retreat.

At one time I used to be a member of a caucus of 20 and when we went on retreats there is a lot of discussion on policy. I would assume that when government goes on retreat or when the New Democrats go on retreat--what are you going on retreat for? It is the taxpayers in all essence that are, in all likelihood, paying for it. You are not talking about policy.

What I am trying to argue is that I personally believe that you used bad judgment in attending this. But having said that, I do not believe that there is anything in rules that said that you could not attend what it is that you in fact attended. I believe you used poor judgment. I believe that members of the opposition have a valid argument to put forward that you should not attend those sorts of meetings, and we trust that in fact that will not occur in the future.

But what we really need in the Manitoba Legislature are two things. One is an elected Speaker, and hopefully we will see that. But in order for that to occur there has to be negotiations, legitimate negotiations where people can actually sit around with the member for Thompson (Mr. Ashton), the member for Brandon West (Mr. McCrae), a representative from the independents can sit down, and we can talk about maybe we can have this elected Speaker after the next provincial election. If the will was there--and I believe it could be there, but we have to get over this vindictive attitude towards you, Madam Speaker--in fact, we could do that.

Along with a plan to have an elected Speaker, what we need is to have some guidelines, because as we look across Canada there really are no guidelines for Speakers. We need to have guidelines which make it very clear from all parties in this Chamber in terms of what is right and what is wrong in terms of a Speaker to be able to do.

Now, Madam Speaker, I really do believe very firmly that you, in comparison to the Speaker prior, might have a difference in personalities, but I can honestly say in terms of my own personal treatment, in terms of the third party treatment, I have not detected anything that you have done that has been any worse than the previous Speaker. I do believe that you did make a mistake. [interjection]

If the member for Dauphin (Mr. Struthers) is trying to imply that I am doing this because of money by squeezing his hands like this, I say shame to the member for Dauphin, and I would suggest to you after I sit down he should apologize for making that acclamation, because I believe I am doing this on principle not because of a political vendetta.

If the member for Dauphin wants to open the rule book, in fact he will see that there is a rule. You cannot impute motives, and if you are trying to say that I am doing this for additional resources I think that member owes me an apology. I anticipate that he should stand up after I am done speaking on this particular issue.

Madam Speaker, I will not get bullied inside this Chamber. I will not be bullied by the Tories. I will not be bullied by the New Democrats. When I believe something is done that is just, I will stand up and I will defend it. I do not believe that, given what has happened since your appointment to the Speaker's chair, you should have to resign. It does not necessarily mean that I agree with everything that you have done. I will still continue to lobby for more additional changes inside this Chamber and no doubt we will agree to disagree on some of those points, but I do not believe that you should have to resign the Chair.

Ms. Jean Friesen (Wolseley): Madam Speaker, I rise to support this motion, which requests your resignation.

I do so with regret, not with vindictiveness, for when you were appointed, even though I was shocked at the manner of the dismissal of the former Speaker, for whom I had and have a strong regard, as a woman I wished you well.

All Speakers will make mistakes. Most, inevitably, will make judgments with which I do not agree, and that much is acceptable. But you have clearly lost the respect of this House, and you should resign. Madam Speaker, you have made rulings which were not just mistakes but which limited the freedom of debate in this House. You ruled that the word "racist" could not be used in the Manitoba Legislature. You were wrong to do that. Racism must be named, and it must particularly be named in this Legislature.

Madam Speaker, during the Manitoba Telephone System debate, you used your power to limit debate and limit the rights of members on this side of the House to speak. That was wrong, and you forfeited our respect. You have delayed for more than a year the judgment on the Premier's unpleasant comments. This was wrong. Such matters should be dealt with quickly and judiciously so that the main business of the House can be conducted in civil terms. The Premier is only the member for Tuxedo and enjoys no special rights in this House except apparently in your eyes.

Madam Speaker, your conduct at Question Period has been repeatedly partisan, permitting several members of the government to exercise rights to speak that are not accorded to all members. They have ignored your orders from time to time and on one occasion have been so disruptive that you were forced to close the House, but no words of censure came from you.

Madam Speaker, you have been repeatedly warned that your conduct was not appropriate, that it was not what the citizens of Manitoba wanted from their Speaker, but you have not heeded and you have not learned.

Now we find that you have been part of a cabinet committee where legislation has been discussed and that you have sat with members of the cabinet to discuss formally government policy with representatives of the students of Manitoba. I know of no Speaker--

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Hon. Linda McIntosh (Minister of Education and Training): I believe that members are not permitted to mislead the House.

I think that the member references a presentation made to all MLAs by the University of Winnipeg students, and there was not government policy discussed. I think she is misleading the House by implying that was a meeting to discuss government policy, when it was in fact a request by the students to make a presentation to all MLAs, including the opposition, who also received the same presentation. It was not a discussion of government policy. She is misleading the House.

Madam Speaker: The honourable Minister of Education does not have a point of order. It is a dispute over the facts.

Madam Speaker, I believe I am being interrupted by the Minister of Education, and I do not believe she has risen on a point of order.

Madam Speaker: Order, please. The Minister of Education, on a point of order?

Mrs. McIntosh: Well, I am not sure. She can tell me if it is a point of order or not. The opposition has asked me to stand now and correct that. The deputy, the government House leader has asked me to do that, or their acting House leader. Do you wish to--

Madam Speaker: Order, please. The only procedure that is acceptable for interruption during debate is when a member rises on a point of order. I would ask the honourable Minister of Education (Mrs. McIntosh) for clarification. Were you up on a point of order?

Mrs. McIntosh: Madam Speaker, I do not believe that this is technically a point of order. It is a request from the opposition. I was giving clarification.

Madam Speaker: There is no point of order.

Ms. Friesen: Madam Speaker, I want to say that the member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux) placed before us, I think, arguments or the evidence that Speakers across Canada do not attend cabinet meetings, they do not attend the statutory committees of cabinet. Different Speakers in different provinces have, from time to time, attended individual caucus meetings. They do not attend cabinet meetings or committees of cabinet, and for very good reason, because it contravenes the fundamental principles of neutrality that must be part of a well-functioning and democratic parliamentary system.

I am disappointed that government and other members of this House cannot see the importance of these very fundamental principles and, now more than ever, Madam Speaker, in a society which is becoming increasingly litigious, I believe that we need to be assured that in Parliament we can speak freely and that in representing our constituents we are all equal members in this House and that the Speaker takes most seriously her responsibility to appear and to be in fact impartial. This is a necessity to maintain our rights as members of this Legislature.

Madam Speaker, the mock show of reluctance that every Speaker makes on being taken to the Chair symbolizes the heavy duties and the weight of responsibility that lies on the shoulders of every Speaker in every parliament in the Commonwealth. It is intended to remind us of the times when Speakers were required to defend all members against the dreadful power of a vengeful king. All Speakers today must understand their place in that history and their task of defending the rights of all members against arrogant and autocratic governments.

In particular I believe the role of a just and impartial Speaker is even more important at the end of the 20th Century when the gap between the private and the public interest has widened and when government of all kinds have been undermined by global agreements on trade, fuelled by greed on an international scale. More than ever our democratic institutions must be clearly and transparently fair and accountable, and that accountability works only when we are assured that we have robust and strong democratic institutions which have earned the confidence and support of an active citizenry.

Madam Speaker, government matters; accountability matters; fair, democratic institutions matter. Those are the issues of principle that we are dealing with. So with regret, you were given opportunities to change and you have chosen not to do so. You might have learned and grown and, yet, you chose to ignore the advice of many members of this House, and it is with regret that I support this motion for your resignation.

Mr. Conrad Santos (Broadway): Madam Speaker, the father of conservatism, Edmund Burke, once said, and I paraphrase, that the conventions and institutions of society is a social compact, not only among the living, but among the living and the dead, and none of us in this present generation can, with impunity, disregard all the customs and usages on which the Mother of all Parliaments, the British Parliament, has been established.

Parliamentary law relates to the customs and rules of conducting public business in the British Parliament and all the other parliaments in the world which use the British Parliament as model. The rules are there. Although we have a saying that rules derive sometimes from violations, rules are there to be observed. What the rule shall be is not subject to the capriciousness of the Speaker. What the rule shall be should not be subject to the foolishness of the members of the House.

They have been established through ages and ages and years and years in the pattern of all generations. Even King Solomon said that what has been it shall be and what it shall be has already been. There is nothing new under the sun. It has been established that the feature that distinguishes the office of the Speaker is impartiality. Impartiality is the source of the legitimacy of the authority of the Speaker. Without impartiality, there is no legitimacy. Without legitimacy, there is no Speaker.

The three characteristics, if we analyze, are that in the first place impartiality there must be. Otherwise, there is nothing to recognize. Given that impartiality is already present, it must be total. It cannot be partial. It must be complete if the members of the House are to have confidence in the presiding officer of this Assembly. Finally, it should be generally recognized and acknowledged and accepted by all the members of the House and by all the people represented by the members of the House. For that matter, Speakers in the past, although they have to be friendly with all the members of the Assembly, generally they tend not to be too friendly with any one of them lest it may appear that any one of them is receiving some special privileges or favour. It is a very difficult role to play.

The impartiality of the Speaker, which is the source of her authority and legitimacy, is also the source of her responsibility. Authority is bestowed in the office of the Speaker for two reasons. The authority of the Speaker represents the power, the dignity and the honour of the Legislature itself, and the honour and the power and dignity of the Legislature, in turn, reflect the honour, dignity of all the members of this Assembly. In turn, the honour, dignity and power of the members of this Assembly reflect the power, honour and authority of all the people in this province whom they represent. Any transgression of the rules, therefore, either by the Speaker or any member of this Assembly, is a transgression of the honour and dignity and power of all the people.

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I would like to quote from Vaclav Havel that the honourable Minister of Northern Affairs (Mr. Newman) had previously quoted. With respect to the responsibility of public people, especially elected people, their responsibility is to think ahead boldly, not to feel the disfavour of the crowd, to imbue their actions with spiritual dimensions, to explain again and again both to the public and to their colleagues that politics does far more than reflect the interests of particular groups or lobbies. After all, politics is a matter of serving the community, which means that it is morality in practice.

There could be debate and arguments about the Speaker attending a public meeting where all interests of special groups are heard. There can be debates pro and con. Perhaps there could be debate also of the Speaker attending caucus retreats. What is good for the goose is good for the gander. What is the sin of one is also the sin of the other, but it does not justify perpetuating that sin. But all sins are forgivable, except the unpardonable ones. To err is human; to forgive, divine. We can forgive some indiscretion, but when the fundamental principle of parliamentary institution is violated, where the cabinet itself decides the politics and policies, the fortune, lives and properties of all the people are at stake on a partisan choice of preference, then the Speaker cannot cross that line. That is an unpardonable sin.

Let me go out with a nice quotation: Vice is nice, but a little virtue won't hurt you.

Hon. David Newman (Deputy Government House Leader): Madam Speaker, I, of course, am speaking strongly against the motion. You know, this is, I would submit, a numbers tactic. It is easier for 23 to gang up on one than it is for 23 to gang up on 30. We have a dependence here on what is purporting to be a principle and a principle which has been expressed in absolute kinds of terms, black and white, rigid rule sort of approach because that is consistent with the numbers tactic. You have to, even if you are ganging up 23 to one, base it on something that smacks of morality, smacks of principle. So you go into the texts and you find what appears to be a statement of principle, whether it be Beauchesne, paragraph 168 or Erskine May and then you take it to an extreme. Then you bring up matters, in most cases long forgotten, to use them as the circumstances to apply what is purported to be the relevant evidence to the principles.

The only current piece which is the add-on is the alleged participation in a cabinet committee meeting. Let us put on the record something that has not been articulated. I, as an upper bencher MLA, participated in meetings of what was called the Urban Affairs committee of cabinet, and I did it along with the mayor and representatives of the council of the City of Winnipeg. I participated and listened and learned as a responsible and conscientious MLA representing the constituency of Riel.

I would submit that members opposite would expect nothing less of any member of their political party who is an elected MLA than to responsibly and conscientiously represent their constituents. For the suggestion to be made by the honourable member for Wolseley (Ms. Friesen) that participation as an MLA in a meeting with student leaders where you have students from your constituency attending that institution and you are invited to the meeting, like other MLAs and all other MLAs, by the students, one would be insulting those students and one's constituents by not participating in such a meeting.

I might say I was at that meeting, and my recollection is that the honourable Speaker, the honourable member for Seine River (Mrs. Dacquay), did not say a word but listened respectfully and, if I recall, left early and apologized for not being able to fulfill the invitation that was extended to her by those students.

If we were really dealing with the substance of things here, if you were really serious about that rather than an expanded, an exaggerated rigid-rule, kind-of-principle approach, you would be approaching this based on the integrity of the Speaker, because after all that is what is the guiding word, that is the guiding hand, that is to whom you are accountable. You are accountable in a character way to your own conscience. If ever there was a conscientious MLA for Seine River, if ever there was a conscientious MLA anywhere and if ever there were a conscientious Speaker, it is represented by this Speaker.

Madam Speaker feels deeply, and to have a gang-up of 23 to one in that isolated position of Speaker without the guidelines the honourable member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux) referred to--there is a vacuum of guidelines--you have to make choices day in and day out when you are a Speaker in any legislature in this country. You have to make choices as to: Where is the balance? Do I go to this? What is my responsibility to my constituents and what is my responsibility to my constituents in terms of being electable next time around? What is the balance?

It is no different than whether you are chair of a board and you are trying to determine balance so that you can have respect at meetings or you are a referee or you are an arbitrator or you are a judge. It does not mean you are cut off from socialization. It does not mean you are cut off from learning, and it does not mean that impartiality deprives you of the opportunity to fulfill your responsibilities in those positions.

Now, I was not confident enough of the authorities cited by members opposite with good intentions, I am sure, but the authorities that they cited represented voices from the past who we have never met and we have never seen, and they may be outdated in some respects, and maybe what they said is not applicable in Manitoba and is not applicable in any jurisdiction in this country where we have the kind of speakership that we have.

Madam Speaker, there was an article, there was a paper presented by Dale Lovick, the Speaker of the British Columbia Legislative Assembly. In his paper presented to the 20th seminar of the Canadian region of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association held in Fredericton on October 25 to 27, 1996, in an executive summary at the beginning, the concluding phrase is, complete renunciation of all political affiliation is unrealistic in Canada, and that Speaker of the Legislature of British Columbia goes on to say: In short, the notion that one cannot be impartial as Speaker unless one severs all partisan connections does not seem to me to be supportable.

I am sure Madam Speaker has attended parliamentary meetings and probably meetings with Speakers, and probably those are the sorts of things that Speakers use as continuing education tools, and they probably discuss these kinds of things. That is the sort of continuing education that is being delivered and published.

It goes on to say: probably the most frank and ingenuous analysis of the predicament for Speakers outside Westminster is provided by the former Speaker of the Fijian House of Representatives, Tomasi Vakatora. In an essay written in 1986, he pushes very hard indeed against the restraints of nonpartisanship, and quote: "Although a Member of Parliament is elevated to the high office of Speaker, he must not lose sight of the fact that basically he is a politician. This is very important to a member if he wants to continue with his political career. If he loses sight of that fact, it could cost him dearly at the next election."

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He goes on to say that the Speakers should be able to attend political meetings as a backstage observer, should be able to explain to constituents the government's stand on certain controversial issues and should keep in close contact with party or government.

His essay concludes with the observation that in Fiji it would be futile to pretend that a Speaker will be elected for another term just because he is the Speaker. The situation in this province and other jurisdictions in this country where you are an appointed Speaker from the party that has chosen because of their majority numbers to be government, you are not, unless you have been a Speaker before and even then you do not know what position you are going to hold. You run as a member of a particular political party and when you have been Speaker you do the same thing. That is the way the system works. It is systemic. It is the way the system works. What do you do? Do you avoid going out and even raising money for your own opportunities to get re-elected? Do you do it under another party name? Do you do it under an independent name? What is the approach you take? There are not guidelines about this, but there is certainly practice.

There is another factor that is made by the Speaker from British Columbia in this continuing education program for Speakers and parliamentarians. He says the impartiality of the Speaker is also well entrenched in that the Speaker is obliged to rule on the basis of clearly defined and well-established practices. Speakers are not free agents who operate on whim or whimsy. What is more, though the point seems to be seldom acknowledged, the Speaker does not stand alone, and quotes, the Speaker is relieved that burden of personal decision in many of the rulings he hands down, thanks to the advice available to him through the professional expertise of the Clerk of the House and his colleagues.

I conclude that it is neither helpful nor necessary for a Canadian Speaker to be nonpartisan in the way of Westminster or in the way suggested by the two Speakers from the Canadian House of Commons, one of whom is quoted in paragraph 168 of Beauchesne. You know, this gets so petty. Where there is a concerted tactic to try and either embarrass the government or eliminate a Speaker--in effect, intimidate a Speaker into resigning--where that is the tactic, then there are no holds barred in trying to dig up evidence, and it will always be of course circumstantial evidence, and that kind of effort leads to the kind of approach which is being taken by members opposite in this particular issue. The future of this, hopefully, will be a vote which will be supported by my party against this particular motion, and we can put all of this behind us.

The honourable member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux) yesterday indicated that matters like this should be referred for consideration by committee and that is a matter which makes eminent sense and was approved of by this House yesterday. But to waste the time of the people we represent rather than debating substantive merits of policy, rather than having the official opposition party put forward some sort of option to the direction set out in the throne speech, rather than addressing the substantive merits of what this government stands for and is proud of and suggesting something better or something different for the people of Manitoba, we have this concentration on a tactic--23 against one--to try and resurrect what was a bad memory in this Legislature and the conduct of honourable members not befitting the term "honourable" throughout the Legislature.

Let us move forward, I submit, let us move forward and really serve the interests of all our constituents and the interests of the people of Manitoba who expect more, Madam Speaker, more from the honourable members of this Legislature. Let us get on with business as has been urged by the honourable member for The Maples (Mr. Kowalski), as has been urged by the honourable member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux), at least we are moving towards a consensus, we are moving towards a consensus.

I would ask the leadership of the honourable members opposite to move in this direction, a consensus to serve the interests of the people of Manitoba by using this Legislature for what it is designed for, and that is thoughtful, serious debate, not the dredging up of circumstantial evidence to try and prove the unprovable, and with a person who is a highly principled, sensitive, individual human being and occupies an office which is deserving of more respect. Thank you.

Mr. Doug Martindale (Burrows): Madam Speaker, when you began your term in office as the Speaker of this Legislature, we in the NDP caucus began on a positive note. Our Leader of the official opposition (Mr. Doer) seconded the nomination of the Premier (Mr. Filmon) that you be the Speaker. We wanted to give you our support. We did not know what kind of a Speaker you were going to be, and we thought that it was only fair and right to give you the benefit of the doubt and give you a chance in the office of Speaker. We were also disappointed that the Premier chose to choose a new Speaker. We were quite happy with the previous Speaker, the member for Gladstone (Mr. Rocan). We thought that his rulings were fair. We also thought that is why the Premier got rid of him, because he was fair to both sides.

We believe that the major problems with our lack of confidence in you as Speaker began during the MTS debate. In my mind, it began when the government House leader rose on a point of order and asked you to make a ruling on it. At that time I believe that you should have refused to rule on that. You should have said that what the government House leader was asking you to do--unfairly, I believe--was to decide how the business of the House should be conducted and should be wound up, and you could have quite easily said that is a matter for the House leaders to negotiate. Certainly, that is normally how a session ends, and that was certainly an option that you could have chosen.

In fact, you could have also pointed out to the government House leader that they could have used speedup, that they could have used closure, that there were a number of options available to the government to get their legislation through the House. Instead, we believe that you chose in a partisan way to help the government get their agenda through the House, which is definitely not the proper role of any Speaker of any democratic legislature. Then, by not allowing our members to speak, you denied us probably what is the most fundamental right of every member in this Chamber, and that is the right to speak. By not allowing us to speak, you denied us that fundamental right in this Legislature.

Now in this session, and there has been a session in between, you have chosen to sit on rulings, on points of order and matters of privilege for an entire session, and we believe that you had many, many opportunities to bring in these rulings. One was only a page and a quarter long. Surely it did not take a year to write that ruling or to research that ruling. In fact, we know that Speakers routinely use their fax machine and consult other legislatures for advice, other Clerks' offices, other Speakers. The former Speaker has told us that he used to consult other Speakers around the commonwealth in other commonwealth countries as to what precedents and rulings there were in other jurisdictions. So for you to not rule on matters of privilege and points of order is quite reprehensible, and we believe that in one case you were defending the Premier. Surely a very partisan thing for a Speaker to do.

Now we have proof. The Minister of Urban Affairs (Mr. Reimer) has put it on the record. The Minister of Native and Northern Affairs (Mr. Newman) was honest enough to put his reply in the record yesterday, the first time he was asked about the Speaker attending a meeting with cabinet ministers and students. So we know that you have done what is unprecedented as far as I know in this Legislature, and that is for a Speaker to attend a meeting of a cabinet committee, namely, the Urban Affairs committee of cabinet. We believe that this violates all the guidelines and all the principles of what a Speaker should and should not do, particularly as enunciated in Beauchesne's at 168, No. 1. I will quote part of No. 1 which says: "The chief characteristics attached to the office of Speaker in the House of Commons are authority and impartiality." Further down we read: "Confidence in the impartiality of the Speaker is an indispensable condition of the successful working of procedure, and many conventions exist which have as their object, not only to ensure the impartiality of the Speaker but also, to ensure that there is a general recognition of the Speaker's impartiality."

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Another way of saying this would be the common phrase, not only must justice be done, but justice must be seen to be done. Not only must the Speaker be impartial and fair, the Speaker must be seen to be impartial and fair. That means, I think, by implication, that all members of this Chamber should see the Speaker as impartial and fair, and you do not exist to defend any member here or some member, but you are here to defend the rights of all members, all honourable members of this Chamber.

Madam Speaker, 168.(2) says: "In order to ensure complete impartiality the Speaker has usually relinquished all affiliation with any parliamentary party. The Speaker does not attend any party caucus nor take part in any outside partisan political activity." Yet we have evidence from the Minister of Urban Affairs (Mr. Reimer) that you have attended a committee of cabinet meeting.

Your role, Madam Speaker, and I would hope that you would be aware of this, is analogous to that of a judge, and I would hope that the member for Riel (Mr. Newman) would appreciate this as a lawyer. I would like to quote from a book that I think has to do with the office of Speaker, and it says: It is not merely a use of analogy to conceive of the Speaker in the modern House of Commons as above all things a judge, nay as the sole judge of parliamentary law. His decisions are called by a name used for expressions of judicial opinion, rulings. The modern president of the House of Commons, then, is a judge who has to apply the rules of procedure to the best of his ability and with perfect impartiality, maintaining with a firm yet sensitive hand the proper relations between the two parties to the proceedings before him, the majority and the minority.

So you are sitting in this esteemed position as a judge. You have to make impartial rulings regarding the majority and the minority, and it is very important that in this role as a judge you are perceived as a judge, that you are seen to be making rulings that are fair and impartial. Now it occurred to me when I was listening to some honourable members participate in this debate that we had a former member here, a former premier, Premier Sterling Lyon, who had a great high opinion of the role of Parliament. In fact he and the premier of Saskatchewan at the time were opposed to an entrenched Charter of Rights and Freedoms in the Canadian Constitution, and the reason was that they believed, and they later were persuaded to not block an entrenched Charter of Rights and Freedoms, but they believed in the superiority of the Legislature. It would be very interesting to discuss with the honourable now Justice Sterling Lyon his view of the role of Speaker, and I suspect that because he had such a high opinion of the role of Parliament and the importance of Parliament that he would agree with the necessity of the impartiality of the Speaker.

We believe that we have a solution to the predicament that we are in now, and that is to have an elected Speaker. We believe that there would be much more support by all members of the Chamber for an elected Speaker because all of us would be committed to that person having voted for that person by secret ballot, and we believe that the government should act now and not wait until after the next election.

I regretfully say that I have lost confidence in you as Speaker, and one of the reasons for my saying that I regret to put this on the record is that I have attended parliamentary conferences with you. I was pleased to be a delegate at the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association conference when it was held in Manitoba when you, indeed, were the host of this Canadian conference. I believe that you did an excellent job as host. I know that you worked very hard on that parliamentary conference, and I have taken part in three or four of these conferences and seminars because I am interested in parliamentary procedure, and we know that Speakers normally take part in all of these conferences. So on a personal level I have enjoyed taking part in parliamentary conferences with you. I commend you for the hard work that you did when you were host of the conference in Winnipeg. So it is with regret that I put on record that I have lost confidence in you as the Speaker of this House, and I regretfully say that I believe in the best interests of the impartiality of the Speaker that you should do the right thing and resign.

Hon. Darren Praznik (Minister of Health): Thank you very much, Madam Speaker, for the opportunity to participate in this debate.

Madam Speaker, whenever a member brings such a motion as this, it would appear to be a very, very serious matter on which it is brought. However, I regret, in listening to the comments of the member for Burrows (Mr. Martindale) and several of his colleagues, I must say that the reasons behind this motion lead me to believe at least that what we are seeing here is a continuation of the debate from last year that hinges not around the impartiality of the Speaker, not around ultimately the operation of this House, but from a very real fact as to what happened last year when one party in this Legislature reneged upon an agreement that we had struck, all political parties, to overhaul the rules of operation of this procedure and that that party, the New Democrats, made a very conscious decision last year, I believe, to throw away their commitment to those rules and those processes and do everything possible, whether or not it was within the rules of this House or whether or not it was within the regular norms of operation or procedure, to take a position on an issue that they felt very strongly on.

Madam Speaker, what I find somewhat hypocritical today in this particular discussion from members opposite is when one recalls what happened here last year and see or remember their commitment to the rules that we all had agreed upon, and you have to wonder where, in essence, their commitment is to parliamentary process and procedure.

Madam Speaker, I was part of the committee over a period of time with my colleague the member for Emerson (Mr. Penner), with the former member for Charleswood, indeed the member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux) over the years, where a great deal of effort--and the member for Burrows (Mr. Martindale) was one of those members--was put into establishing a set of rules to operate this procedure of this Assembly not only to make it more civil and effective for the people of Manitoba in our day-to-day operations but to change a fundamental principle, I guess, of parliamentary life which was to provide some regularity to our sessions.

Unlike many other Chambers in the Commonwealth who have moved to a regular sitting, Manitoba has not, and part of the fundamental reform that we attempted to address at that time, Madam Speaker, was to give regularity to our sessions, that we would have regular times in which we began and ended our sessions. We would have a fall and a spring session. We would have periods in which we had rules by which we as government were compelled to introduce our legislation in exchange for the opposition ensuring that it came to a final conclusion, a vote, within a regular period of time.

If there was one error that we made in that committee, and maybe we made it consciously, was that we did not perhaps give enough definition to mechanisms around how that rule was to be given effect. One of the reasons why, in fact, we did not is because we appreciated the complexity of that rule and relied on literally the good will of all to ensure that it was carried out.

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Madam Speaker, last year, when we got onto a debate over an issue which was very fundamental to the political beliefs and views of many in this Chamber, certainly members of the New Democratic Party, where this government had lived up to its part of the bargain in introducing legislation within the rules provided, what happened, in essence, was the good will necessarily to give effect to the rules to which we had agreed quickly dissipated on behalf of members of the New Democratic Party and left in the most awkward of positions which was to find a mechanism to give effect to the rules of this House. What the New Democrats really objected to was the fact that Madam Speaker had to give effect to the rules that they had agreed to. [interjection]

Madam Speaker, the member for Burrows (Mr. Martindale) says that Madam Speaker did not have to. Well, yes, Madam Speaker could have ignored the will of this House in establishing its rules and let one group hijack a process and throw away rules that members on this side and members of the Liberal Party had relied on to that point in time. In fact, I would argue that was extremely dishonourable on their part. In fact, there were days in this House we did not know which faction of the New Democratic Party was in charge as they battled amongst themselves at that particular time. So my regret is that we collectively, as members of this House, put Madam Speaker into a position where she had to do that which we said we would do by our own good will but were not able to because the good will quickly dissipated from members of the New Democratic Party.

Madam Speaker, the member for Burrows (Mr. Martindale) spoke about the right to speak as being a very fundamental right of members of this House, and it is. It is. But equally so is the fundamental right of the members of this House to make decision, the fundamental right of members of this House to vote to make decision. What we saw last year, and for which Madam Speaker, very regrettably, is being asked by members of the New Democratic Party to carry some responsibility when it was not hers, was the fact that members opposite wanted to deny all members of this House a fundamental right and that was to make decision. Because they did not represent the majority, ultimately they pushed the right of the minority to speak and delay well beyond the rules to which we had agreed and wanted to push it to the rules where, in essence, they would grind parliamentary operation to a halt.

Madam Speaker, what is so fundamentally sad about this is that when we made the decision to change the rules--and the member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux) was in that room--we understood that we were making fundamental change in those rules, that there were preconditions in legislation and there were results, and that members of the government relied, by carrying out and meeting the preconditions, on the agreed-upon results which were that matters would come to a conclusion by a specific date. Now members opposite try to hide behind their extremely unparliamentary actions last year by saying there were other mechanisms. Well, we had agreed that the mechanism or the result would be a vote and members opposite initially were committed to that good will and betrayed their trust and the trust of other members.

We are being asked today by this resolution to judge you as our Speaker once again in this Assembly. We do that when we initially elect you, Madam Speaker, and today we are being asked to judge you again. Well, let us look at the criticisms that are being made. We know where this comes from. This is still a leftover from last year. We look at the criticism of slowness to make decisions on rulings and matters of privilege. We appreciate during that period that there were many matters taken under advisement. One of the prerogatives of the Speaker is the timing in which those matters are brought back and Madam Speaker has to make a judgment call as to appropriate times to bring matters back before the House because, obviously, sometimes the decision for a speedy result may result, given the mood of the House, in a further delay in its operation.

But that fundamentally is a right of the Speaker to bring in those rulings. In fact, there are many cases in other jurisdictions where sometimes Madam Speaker does not in fact bring in a ruling at all, but that is your right and prerogative. I have never once in my many years in this House heard a complaint about delay, and there have been many rulings that have taken long periods of time in which to come forward.

Madam Speaker, on the matter of rules and procedures there is a point that I may have missed in my earlier remarks that when I scan my notes I think is worthy of mentioning. Many of us in this House sat through a period when the Meech Lake Accord came here, and the former member for Rupertsland, one Mr. Elijah Harper, by using the rules of the House, was able to delay a matter coming towards a conclusion or debate on the floor till a deadline passed.

What is interesting between that period and what we saw last winter--and I wanted to make this point--we on this side, members of the Liberal Party respected the rules of this House, and the rules of the House allowed Mr. Harper to delay those matters, but the rights of minority members and individual members were protected. [interjection] We all did. But, Madam Speaker, we had no choice. It was part of that. We had changed our rules to allow a period for bills to be brought in with set dates and periods for them to be brought to a concluding vote. And just as Mr. Harper had a right to rely on the rules to do what he did, members on this side of the House, members of the Liberal Party, indeed even members of the New Democratic Party had a right to rely on those new rules to see bills brought to a concluding vote where every member would have had an opportunity to cast their judgment on the bill at hand and a decision to be made. Members of the New Democratic Party did not respect the agreement that they made.

Madam Speaker, the matter at hand that precipitated this particular resolution is one of your attendance at a particular meeting or gathering of a cabinet committee. There is no doubt that Speakers have a responsibility to show impartiality, to indeed act in an impartial manner, but they also have equally, so I believe, a responsibility to their constituents and to represent the interests of their constituents, to advocate on behalf of their constituents, and that is a balance.

Every Speaker of every parliament in the Commonwealth has had to try to find the right balance. There is a history of evolution in this particular area. My colleague the member for Riel (Mr. Newman), the acting government House leader, spoke very eloquently about the changing role or development in that impartiality, in that balance between being an elected member and being a Speaker.

Madam Speaker, in our own House of Commons there was a time when that impartiality of being a Speaker meant that when you assumed the office of Speaker you ended your affiliation with a particular party, you sat as an independent, and the opposition accommodated that by ensuring in the next general election that candidates with their affiliation did not contest your seat. That has not happened in Canada since the early 1970s. In fact, the last Speaker that I can recall anywhere in Canada who gave up their party affiliation was Speaker Lamoureux, back in the early 1970s, who was the member for Stormont-Dundas out of Ontario in the House of Commons. After the retirement of Speaker Lamoureux, I know of no other Speaker who abandoned their party affiliation, who sat as an independent, who had the support of the opposition in not contesting their seat at the time of the general election.

So we know that a Speaker has a responsibility of impartiality in the operation of the House. We know that they are bound by precedent and by principles and assisted in the advice of able Clerks who are learned in these matters. As the member for Riel (Mr. Newman) has pointed out, those are guiding posts for a Speaker in the operation of the Assembly. We know as well that Speakers in the Manitoba Legislature, indeed I think all the parliaments and legislatures of Canada and most in the Commonwealth, also come with a party affiliation, also have a constituency to represent. Indeed, Madam Speaker, in our own Debates and Proceedings, the Speaker is listed here as a member of the Progressive Conservative Party. I have yet in my over nine years in this House seen any member of the New Democratic Party rise to say that should not be the case.

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So we know that there are those two roles. We know that we have debated this from time to time. We know that those two roles are there, that the Speaker comes as a member of a political party with a constituency to represent. We know as well that in the office of Speaker and in the Chair of this House, the Speaker has a duty of impartiality and is guided by precedent, tradition and rules, and it is a balance for a Speaker to make.

Madam Speaker, in my experience in working with you and knowing you, I know that you have respected that and you have always tried to maintain that balance with integrity, with honour, and respecting the tradition of the office in which you sit. I also know you to have been and to be a very strong advocate on the part of the people of Seine River who have twice sent you to this House to represent them. You have always handled that balance with honour and integrity.

Now, Madam Speaker, with respect to a particular cabinet committee meeting, yes, we are aware of the sensitivity around cabinet committee meetings, but in the operation of our own government, we know that this particular committee from time to time has had briefings for urban MLAs on issues, and that any involvement you have had has been to receive information that was important to you for your constituents. I know of no occasion when you have been an active participant in the formation of partisan or government policy that has come to this Chamber where you have crossed that line and that balance. What we have in this Assembly today--and by the way, other Speakers in the last 20 years in this Assembly, going back I think to Mr. Hanuschak, to Mr. Fox, Mr. Graham, Mr. Walding, Ms. Phillips, Speaker Rocan have all, I am sure, ensured that the interests of their constituents were represented as best they could within that balance between being the Speaker and also being a member of this Assembly.

Madam Speaker, members opposite attempt to attack you on the basis of your attendance at the meeting. They have not raised a matter where you have, nor can they cite a matter, actively been involved and engaged in promoting or developing a government policy to come to this Assembly and use your office to promote it or push it forward. They attempt once again to attack you on the basis of somewhat an innuendo and to try to give the appearance that you are not maintaining that balance. In knowing you, and in serving this House with you, I am very proud to say that you have always maintained that balance, as I have said before, with honour and integrity.

When you boil everything down here, when you look at the real issue here, the real issue is the fact that a year ago in this Chamber, the New Democratic Party made a conscious decision to abandon their commitment to a new set of rules and to hijack this Legislative Assembly and to take away the right of every member of this Assembly to cast a vote and make a decision on a matter of important public business. They, the members opposite, put you in a position where you had to do what our House leaders and caucuses should have done, which was to give a mechanism to the rules that we had put into place.

We put you in that position and you responded as any Speaker had a duty to do, which is to put into effect mechanisms to give effect to the rules that this House agreed on, so that matters of a business as agreed on could come to a decision by the 57 elected members of this House.

Madam Speaker, if there is anyone here today whose interest and commitment to parliamentary democracy should be challenged, it should be members of the New Democratic Party, who did not live up to their agreement and put Madam Speaker and parliamentary tradition in this province into dispute. I am very pleased to support you on this motion.

Mr. Gord Mackintosh (St. Johns): Madam Speaker, it is just incredible, if not pathetic, to hear the responses of the two members opposite. The Speaker has just been caught attending a cabinet meeting. The first time, I am sure, ever in this province's history, in the history of any province--oh, you shake your head. You want to engage in debate, I know. In any parliamentary democracy in this world, never has a Speaker been attending cabinet meetings, and the members opposite, without any regard to the people who will come after, to governments and oppositions that will come later, have the gall to stand up in this House, with backgrounds in the democratic institutions of this province and this country, and say everything is just fine. I find it incredible and pathetic.

We have the Minister of Health (Mr. Praznik) stand up here and go on this revisionist rant without a--[interjection] Did this member, once during his speech, talk about the rule that was in effect on that sitting day in November, about the requirements, the normal requirements, the word "normally," and what happens that day? Did he, once in his speech, acknowledge that this government asked for and got a rule change that allowed it to extend the sitting for unfinished business? In other words, they recognized that there could be unfinished business on the last day of the session. Once in his speech, did he talk about all the tools at this government's hands to end the session, whether it was closure or speedup or any other ones? No, Madam Speaker.

But I want to address the issue before this House and not what happened last year. Then we had the Minister of Northern and Native Affairs (Mr. Newman) stand up, and indeed it was a chilling account of how he sees this democratic institution. There was a member who could not find any citation, any convention, any principle of common sense to justify your attendance at a cabinet meeting. Did he look to the Parliament of Canada for some precedent? No. Did he go to the Mother of Parliaments, Westminster, and look for precedent? No, but he did find some musings of someone from Fiji, some musings, and he found some musings of a greenhorn Speaker from British Columbia. Dale Lovick, who wrote the article that the member quoted, does not attend cabinet meetings. That is the answer, and it reflects so poorly once again on the Minister of Justice (Mr. Toews) who yesterday got up here on a matter of fact and said that the Speaker in Saskatchewan attends cabinet meetings. That was not true. That is the Attorney General. That is the extent to which they are going to go to justify your going to cabinet meetings.

Have they not thought, have they not seen the pictures of all the Premiers in Rooms 255 and 254? I do not know if they noticed--maybe they do not want to see it--but they are not all Progressive Conservative Premiers. Governments come and go. And there will be a day when that government is gone and those members are sitting over here, when the youth in their party may be represented in this House, and what precedent are they supporting? They are supporting a precedent that the Speaker is certainly not only more than welcome but, if I understand their argument, is an important part of cabinet meetings. Here we had two members that practised law and studied law saying that was just okey-dokey.

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You could imagine the democratic institutions if they had the say. You would have the judges free in this province to go and consult with just defence council, maybe another day just with the Crown attorney. I know their contempt for judges in this province, as I have seen through the wage-adjustment policies of this administration. They are not thinking ahead, and they are not thinking of what a terrible affront to parliamentary democracy has just been discovered.

I was really taken aback by the response yesterday of the Housing minister when he was asked if he recalled the Speaker taking part in the cabinet meeting. He got up there and he shook his hand, you know, or shook his head; gee, I just cannot remember, you know. Imagine that. A minister not even thinking that there was something strange or unique or memorable about a Speaker of the Legislature attending a cabinet meeting. That was just the ordinary course. It makes me believe that you, Madam Speaker, have been attending meeting after meeting after meeting of cabinet. That is what that response of the minister leads me to believe. I would like to hear the answer. No, I would like to ask the Minister of Housing (Mr. Reimer), has Elvis been at one of your recent cabinet meetings, and the minister would get up and say, geez, I have to check the record. I think he had to check the figures or something. Can you fathom the misunderstanding of how this system works?

I am not standing here today on this issue because I want to. I had enough of parliamentary procedure. I sat at that table. I came back, and I was elected to deal with matters of public policy, the problems that my constituents are disproportionately having to deal with under this administration and to put forward positive alternatives to make our community work better together. But, Madam Speaker, I have to stand here today and deal with this. It has to be dealt with before I know that the values and ideas that my constituents bring through me to this Chamber are going to be dealt with, and I can propose them in a fair way without being prejudiced by the actions of the Chair.

It was just on Monday when I commented that it appeared your actions in the recent past have made you an adjunct of the cabinet, and here we are just two days later. Indeed, the office of Speaker in Manitoba has been made an adjunct of the cabinet of Manitoba. You, Madam Speaker, surely have not heeded one of the very important lessons in speakership in Manitoba. Do you know the last time a Speaker of this Legislature went in cahoots with the government, that Speaker was tarred and feathered? Interestingly, it was The City of Winnipeg Act and urban affairs issues that were at stake there. You pass by the portrait of Speaker Bird outside of your office. I am sure you are aware of that history. We do not tar and feather. But was that not a lesson that I thought that you would have heeded, that you would have listened to?

It is not just you but this government and its actions, its attitude, its arrogance, its callousness about democracy that has corrupted this place. Unless this is dealt with, unless you resign, unless the government acknowledges the wrongfulness of what has happened, this will remain a precedent and forever, from now on, this place will be different, and it will be different for the worse.

Now the member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux) said, there are no rules to govern such questions of conduct. Well, this place operates on the basis of convention, and I dare suggest on the basis of common sense.

I want to turn to the article that the Minister of Northern and Native Affairs (Mr. Newman) quoted from. I will go to the Parliament of Canada and to the Mother of Parliaments at Westminster. You know, James Jerome, a highly, highly respected former Speaker of the House of Commons, refused to even go to public events where there would be only a member of one political party in attendance. He said, and I quote: "No matter how informal the event, I always made sure that if one Member of Parliament was to be there, we invited another from each political party. I never attended so much as a testimonial dinner for any of my former Liberal colleagues and indeed was never at any party function of any sort. Even in the 1979 election my campaign literature dealt exclusively with local problems, and in public meetings, on radio or television, I did the same thing. During the campaign I never made any reference to the performance of the Government or the Opposition parties."

Erskine May says--and I want the member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux) to heed this--"Confidence in the impartiality of the Speaker is an indispensable condition of the successful working of procedure, and many conventions exist which have as their object not only to ensure impartiality of a Speaker but also to ensure that his [or her] impartiality is generally recognized."

Whether this is a rule does not matter because it was Horace King, the Speaker at Westminster from 1965 to 1971, who said: "After a long period of evolution, the impartiality of the modern Speaker has become almost mathematical--certainly beyond doubt or question." He says that this conception lies at the heart of parliamentary democracy.

But even Mr. Lovick in his musings notes that it is an elected Speaker--and he is quoting John Fraser that by secret ballot is indeed "a guarantee of the Speaker's independence." So it is in that context that Mr. Lovick does his musings, and he goes on to say, and I quote: "To be sure, the Speaker must be impartial and scrupulously fair, and indeed perceived to be so."

Now, Madam Speaker, not only are you attending cabinet meetings, but you seem to have no hesitation at all in meeting with government members before the public. You are not just skulking around in the shadows of this building. You do not seem to appreciate how you have imperiled your office. You seem by those actions to have consciously become partisan, and I say this in the context of the rulings that you have been making in this House and your actions last November.

Madam Speaker, your tenure as Speaker must now be over. That is it. You have made a conscious decision to put government interests ahead of the interests of this institution over which you preside, and having done so there is no doubt that you cannot continue on.

Look around, Madam Speaker, this place is not doing what it could be doing. This place is not functional. This is a not a healthy Legislature. Why? Look at yourself and consider the attitudes of this government that sees you as one of their tools to consolidate and enhance their power not for the sake of the governed and for the people of Manitoba but for their own sake and for their own ends.

Well, Madam Speaker, it is over. You must resign. You cannot continue. You have no choice.

Mr. Kowalski: [inaudible] to frame my remarks with a couple of mentions of some topics that have gone on before, some factors in what I am going to say. One of them was the member for Dauphin (Mr. Struthers) rubbed his fingers together--

Mr. Tim Sale (Crescentwood): I believe the honourable member's microphone is not turned on, Madam Speaker. At least I cannot hear it.

Madam Speaker: Order, please. May I get clarification? My audio is working. Are there problems with other members' audio? Perhaps it is the individual member's earpiece that is nonfunctional?

An Honourable Member: Try it now.

* (1550)

Mr. Kowalski: As I was saying, the member for Dauphin rubbed his fingers together to try to impute that anything we had to say would be affected by some belief that support for our vote in any matter could have affected the amount of resources our party has. Well, if that was the case, I would be supporting this motion. In that case, we would not be getting $500 a month. So the proof is in the pudding. If we had been doing this to get support from the Speaker and to get more resources, we sure failed, because we are only getting 500 bucks a month. So I think the member should be apologizing for trying to impute those motives to anything we said or any way we voted. I would appreciate that apology.

Secondly, we have talked about the impartiality of the Speaker and, after the member for Riel (Mr. Newman) spoke, I had my researcher pull off the Internet that paper done by Dale Lovick, the Speaker from B.C., and I found it interesting that the subtitle of his paper here is Impartial But Not Non-Partisan. So you can be partisan and still be impartial, the same as a referee.

My classmate from recruit class, Jackie Watt--[interjection] Again, Madam Speaker, this party here does not want to hear another member speak. Could I be allowed to speak without interruptions from them because they do not like what I am saying? Could they be quiet and listen? Maybe they do not like what I am saying, but I have the right to say it here.

Once again, Madam Speaker, it shows the decorum that these members are willing, that they are the ones interfering with the good functioning of this House. I am trying to speak, and once again they do not like what I am saying so they think by yelling loud, by interrupting they can intimidate me. Well, they will not.

Once again, like the poor classmate, like the little kid in school, just cannot give one more remark. Let us hear the last word now. Unbelievable. Unbelievable.

But, as I was saying, impartiality is in the eye of the beholder. They have talked about the previous Speaker being more impartial. Well, that was in their eyes. As a member elected in 1993 and coming into this Chamber, it was a number of times that I felt that our seven-member caucus, because we were the smaller caucus, was always at the short end of the stick when it came to the Speaker as far as the rotation of private members' hours, of MUPIs, because there was that razor-thin majority, and to get the co-operation of the opposition with the bigger numbers, he always gave way to the path of least resistance. I have not noticed that in this session, but that is my perception.

But when I felt that, did I call for the resignation of Speaker Rocan just because I felt that he was favouring the NDP constantly in rotation of private members' hours, in rotation of MUPIs and seating arrangements? No, because when you are playing a game, and I do not want to trivialize what goes on here by it being a game, but if you are playing a game and you do not like the referee's ruling, you go on and you play the game some more.

Carrying on with the analogy, you know, this game that we are playing, right now we are debating the throne speech. We are in the fourth day. Do you know how many speakers we have had on the throne speech from the opposition? Three. Three. But, you know, I see it is a good political tactic, and possibly if I was in the NDP caucus I would support that tactic, because every time they criticize the Speaker they resurrect the MTS debate, and I am sure in the next general election that they want to remind people and, by keeping criticizing the Speaker, they remind the media, they remind the public about the MTS debate. That is a good political tactic and, hey, that is what this is about, politics. But then to try to cloak it with the integrity of a higher issue I think is very empty.

Now, one thing, and I will be anxious to hear especially from the opposition House leader (Mr. Ashton) an explanation if he could explain to me, they have acknowledged that in many parliaments, in many legislative assemblies in Canada and elsewhere that the Speaker does attend caucus meetings. They accept that and they say: okay, we do not do that here, but that is acceptable to them, but they say that attending a cabinet subcommittee meeting, that is not acceptable, and I tend to think that if I was giving you advice, I would say, do not go to cabinet meetings.

Yes, but what is the difference between a caucus meeting and a cabinet subcommittee meeting? It all depends on how you view your caucus. Now, does the Conservative caucus direct cabinet to make decisions? Is it partisan or is it, the cabinet dictates to caucus? So if you are saying it was acceptable that she went to the caucus meeting, where minutes are not kept--minutes are not kept in caucus meetings, okay--so the Speaker could say theoretically in a caucus meeting: do not worry, I will get that legislation through. There would be no record of it. But at a cabinet meeting, minutes are kept, I believe, so I have less fears of a Speaker attending a cabinet meeting because this would have to be ratified in caucus where minutes are kept and someday that will be on the public record. [interjection]

Once again the member interrupts. Once again she interrupts.

Madam Speaker: Order, please.

Mr. Kowalski: Once again, the constant interruption shows the lack of respect for the process that goes on in here, just as continually bringing up the Speaker as a political tactic shows a lack of respect for the process here. The fact that we have only been able to put up three speeches on the opposition side about the throne speech shows a lack of respect for the process here.

So, yes, I agree with my colleague from Inkster who said, yes, it probably was--no, I will not say probably. It was an unwise thing for the Speaker in the present circumstances to attend any cabinet meeting, but there are not clear rules. They referred to Beauchesne a number of times as being the rules. Well, Beauchesne applies in those parliaments in the other provincial legislatures, right? Does that mean in every other legislative assembly where the Speaker attends caucus meetings that they are ignoring Beauchesne?

So I am looking forward to the comments of the opposition House leader to respond to some of the things I am saying, but my belief now after reading this document off the Internet from Dale Lovick, MLA and NDP Speaker in the B.C. Legislature, about impartiality but not nonpartisan, hearing the comments, knowing that in many provincial legislatures, Speakers attend caucus meetings. Unless I hear something very convincing, I will be voting against the motion.

Mr. Ashton: I will be the final speaker from our side on the motion, and I do want to respond to the concerns--

Madam Speaker: Order, please. I am just getting clarification, but I believe the honourable member has already spoken to the motion.

An Honourable Member: No, he raised on a point of privilege and then moved the motion.

Mr. Ashton: Madam Speaker, I had spoken on the matter of privilege, I had moved the motion. However, you had decided to put the motion directly to the House. I am asking for the opportunity to speak on the motion in response to the debate. I realize it is a bit unusual--[interjection] Well, that is fine. It is bit of a different circumstance when we are dealing with a matter of no confidence in the Speaker, because normally there is a ruling on the prima facie nature on the matter of privilege in which case the debate does begin on that part, but I have not spoken on the matter of privilege since you put it to the House. I would ask for the opportunity to speak on that largely in response to some of the concerns expressed by the member for The Maples (Mr. Kowalski).

I appreciate the opportunity to just put a few comments on the record. I want to say just very clearly from the beginning, I think the debate that we have had has been a useful debate, but I regret to say that I think the member for Riel (Mr. Newman) and the member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux) have made our point. Not once has anybody in the debate ever indicated any precedent anywhere, not only in Canada or Fiji or anywhere else in the Commonwealth, of a Speaker attending, as we have documented evidence--this is not circumstantial evidence to the member for Riel by the way, but documented by the response of the minister today, by the government House leader yesterday, that the Speaker of this House attended a cabinet committee--a cabinet committee.

* (1600)

Now, I want to deal with that because that is the root cause here. I want to put on the record, too, by the way, that we were aware that the Speaker has attended caucus events, caucus meetings. We never raised it, and I can tell you, I would have argued and I would have probably--and I do see previous Speakers from time to time--I would argue in this province, given the tradition in this province, that in itself I think is questionable, but there was a precedent and I read this into the record on moving the matter of privilege from 1987. I mean, talk about hypocrisy. You know, to say one thing in 1987 about the attendance at caucus meetings and not understand that we are making a point that goes beyond that in this case.

Let us deal with this very fundamental point. We are not talking about attending a caucus meeting--that does occur out of session in other jurisdictions. I commend the member for Inkster (Mr. Lamoureux) for doing the research, by the way. We did the same research, because yesterday members attempted to put on the record information that was incorrect. Nowhere in the country does the Speaker attend cabinet meetings or cabinet committee meetings. There was reference made to Saskatchewan. We checked that, that is not the case. The fact is in some jurisdictions the Speaker does attend caucus meetings out of session. We acknowledged that earlier. That was made in my comments moving the matter of privilege. I think there is a fundamental distinction between that, and I look to the member for Riel (Mr. Newman) here, and what has occurred in this case.

By the way, I want to say to the member for Riel I have a great deal of respect for him, but I resent the statement he put on the record of somehow suggesting this is some 23 versus one. I want to quote to the member opposite, by the way, who should know and I am sure does as a lawyer, perhaps members in this House who do not understand, that under the British parliamentary system we have had the same kind of developments we have had with our legal system, the common-law system. We are a system of laws that is based on precedent. It is based not on strictly statute law but is based on centuries of tradition. That is absolutely the fundamental basis of our legal system and of our parliamentary system.

But I want to say, the fundamental principle of parliamentary law, Sir John Bourinot, Parliamentary Procedure and Practice, which is the first citation in Beauchesne: The principles of Canadian parliamentary law are: "To protect a minority and restrain the improvidence or tyranny of a majority." This is the fundamental role of the Speaker, to protect the minority in this House. The Speaker is not the minority. The minority in that case, that reference, is the opposition. You know, I say to the member for The Maples (Mr. Kowalski) that I share his concern. I have sat in this House and the third party can be pretty lonely, and I do by the way reference the fact that some of the things he did talk about were decided. They apply to us when we were in the third party as well. I sometimes, and I do not think I am giving away any secrets, remind some of my own colleagues vis-a-vis the Liberals, having been there before, what it is like, and sometimes we may not agree, but I think we have to have some sympathy for that position.

You know what? I have been on government as well. I guess I have had--I do not know if you would call it a luxury to be on government, the second party and third party in this House, but I say the same thing to members of the government. There are members on the other side who probably do say this in their own caucus meeting, to remind them of what it is like on the other side. In 1987 I sat in the government benches. I remember members opposite sitting on the opposition side and how concerned they were at a Speaker attending what, a cabinet committee? No. Something that is done in other jurisdictions. They then called for the resignation of the Speaker. Now, to the member for Riel (Mr. Newman), were they intimidating the Speaker? By the way, the opposition in 1986 did not even have the courtesy to second the nomination, something we did. We gave the Speaker a chance in 1995. I say to all members of the House, whether you are in government or you are in second party, in third party--I speak from personal experience--what you say today will be read back to you at some time in the future because you are not ever going to be permanently in that position.

Sterling Lyon used to remind us, and I was a rookie member at the time, he talked about temporary governments. Now he referred to a government at the time that had the largest majority I think in recent history. We had 34 seats. Guess what? I hate to say this. Sterling Lyon was right. It was a temporary government. It is no different, it is no different the other way. All I ask for members to do, and particularly members for the government, because I do not think you get the point here. First of all I heard all these disingenuous speeches from government members saying how they have confidence in the Speaker. You know, that does not surprise me. Has it not dawned on you that we understand she is a colleague? She was elected as a Conservative. What we are concerned about in the opposition--and you probably say good for her. I do not think you were unhappy with what happened last time, last year, in MTS. You are not unhappy with attendance at the caucus meeting, but understand, understand here, it is not a question of whether the Speaker can continue to do her job as a member of the Legislature as well as being Speaker. Every Speaker in this province since 1870 has continued to be a member of the Legislature. They have gone, they have represented constituents. We have always had that ability. We have never had a Speaker attend a cabinet committee, in this case a cabinet committee dealing with a major piece of legislation outlined in the throne speech that we are going to be dealing with.

I plead to members opposite and indeed to the Liberals, do you not get it? Do you not understand that is crossing the line? Do you not understand that if you are on the other side of the floor, do you not think you would be arguing what we are arguing today?

I want to finish by suggesting, walk a mile in our shoes in this Legislature in the opposition, and I say that collectively, because it is not easy. We are not invited to these cabinet committees, by the way. It is interesting. This is not some open item. The government minister I think almost gave it away yesterday when he said: any con was invited to attend. I am sure he was going to say con-servative member.

Listen. I have been in government. I have been in second party. I have been in third party. Understand this, and I say this to all members. What you do internally within your government, you can invite whoever you want to your meetings, but do not take away the ability of the Speaker to be impartial. The member for the Maples (Mr. Kowalski) talked about impartiality and nonpartisanship. There is exactly the point here. In this case the Speaker was elected as a Conservative, so she is not a nonpartisan individual. Every Speaker we have had when we have not had nonpartisan government has been elected under a partisan label. The key element though is, the moment you become Speaker you have to separate yourself from that. You can still work for your constituents, but you do not then cross over starting off as a partisan individual and then become a partisan, impartial individual as a Speaker. Think about it. I think the member for The Maples asked the right questions.

I think the only answer is, we know, everybody in this House I believe knows, that what the Speaker did was wrong. I think everybody else knows that we are not going to resolve this matter until we do the right thing, we do by the way what every other jurisdiction in Canada has done, and that is recognize the only way to ensure that you have a Speaker that has the confidence of all members of the House, who is impartial not only in day-to-day activities but in terms of clear appearance, is to have an elected Speaker.

I regret we have to do this, Madam Speaker, and I ask you one more time, because I know the government Whip will be on this, but I ask you to consider your position as Speaker. I think you would do a great service to this House, and we can move into the future if you would resign and allow us to move the next step, to have an elected Speaker in the Manitoba Legislature.

Madam Speaker: Is the House ready for the question?

Some Honourable Members: Question.

Madam Speaker: The question before the House is that this House call on the Speaker to resign because of her violation on the principles of the impartiality and nonpartisanship of the Speaker's office.

Madam Speaker: All those in favour of the motion, please say yea.

Some Honourable Members: Yea.

Madam Speaker: All those opposed, please say nay.

Some Honourable Members: Nay.

Madam Speaker: In my opinion, the Nays have it.

Mr. Ashton: Yeas and Nays, Madam Speaker.

Madam Speaker: A recorded vote has been requested. Call in the members.

* (1630)

The question before the House is that this House call on the Speaker to resign because of her violation of the principles of the impartiality and nonpartisanship of the Speaker's office.

A RECORDED VOTE was taken, the result being as follows:

Ashton, Cerilli, Chomiak, Dewar, Doer, Evans (Interlake), Friesen, Jennissen, Mackintosh, Martindale, McGifford, Mihychuk, Reid, Robinson, Sale, Santos, Struthers.

Cummings, Driedger, Dyck, Faurschou, Findlay, Gaudry, Gilleshammer, Helwer, Kowalski, Lamoureux, Laurendeau, McAlpine, McIntosh, Mitchelson, Newman, Penner, Pitura, Praznik, Radcliffe, Reimer, Render, Rocan, Stefanson, Sveinson, Tweed, Vodrey.

Mr. Clerk (William Remnant): Yeas 17, Nays 26.

Madam Speaker: The motion is accordingly defeated.

There are 11 minutes remaining in Question Period.